Somerville runner supporting bereavement camp in his first Boston Marathon

Julia Taliesin

Friday

Jan 4, 2019 at 6:25 PMJan 7, 2019 at 12:37 PM

Peter Heilbron has never been able to sit still.

The Spring Hill resident is funneling all that energy towards running the Boston Marathon this spring, and the fundraising that comes with it.

Heilbron is running for Camp Kita, a week-long summer bereavement camp in Maine for kids who have lost a family member to suicide. The cause is close to his heart, as Heilbron’s sister committed suicide when they were young.

“I was 12 and Sairah was 18 when she ended her life,” he said. “I had such a great support system, that I wanted to help kids who may not have to live and cope with it.”

Growing up in the Washington, D.C. area, Heilbron said his sister was a dedicated and talented artist.

“Sairah was a great artist,” he said. “She went to special arts school in D.C. [Edmund Burke School], and was the only person to get a 5 on the arts AP test there to date.”

She had also traveled to Silencio, a small town on the central west coast of Costa Rica, for two weeks, where she painted a mural of Red Riding Hood on the walls of a local school.

“I’d like my personal campaign to be centered on the efforts of Camp Kita,” Heilbron said. “Every step I take on April 15 is for Sairah, nonetheless.”

Heilbron is committed to raising $12,500, and (as of publication) had raised a little over $5,000.

Heilbron likes to race against himself, so, even though Heilbron has not run an official race longer than 10-kilometers, his sights are set on finishing the marathon.

“A marathon has always been a goal for me, and I might as well shoot for the moon and, you know the saying, land among the stars,” he said. “That’s where my drive comes from. I always like to be working towards something, [and] I’m still learning a lot along the way.”

Heilbron has witnessed the marathon every year since he moved to Boston for school in 2012. After watching the elites finish the race, he was with friends on a rooftop in Beacon Hill when the bombs went off at the 2013 marathon.

“I heard ‘pop, pop’ and saw smoke rising,” he said. “I watched the helicopters swarming in. I would have had to walk right by Boylston to get home, so I just stayed at my friends’ place that night.”

This year, the marathon takes place exactly six years to the day of the Boston Marathon Bombings.

So, what’s next for Heilbron?

“I want to complete the Presidential Traverse [difficult trek in White Mountains] in one day, or 10 hours,” he said.

Heilbron, whose father lived in Somerville's Winter Hill neighborhood for nearly a decade, is particularly fond of the local food and music scene. He loves catching a show at Once or The Rockwell and grabbing a drink at Mikes Food & Spirits or a bite at El Potro in Union.

“The bartenders at Mike’s know me a little too well,” he admitted.

Heilbron hopes to organize a fundraiser at a local Somerville eatery sometime soon. But, in the end, he hopes that if Somervillians don’t want donate to his cause, they will do something else in his sister’s honor.

“If you don’t want to support me,” he said, “support your local arts program.”

If Somerville residents see Heilbron running around Winter Hill or on the bike path, he said he would welcome a greeting, and a cheer to get him to the finish line.